Dolphins @ Steelers - Pregame Thoughts - An Interesting Challenge
Screenshot via Steelers Youtube
The Dolphins have left the warm confines of Miami, and tomorrow night, they’ll join us psychos in football country for a COLD Monday Night Football game against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Earlier this season, this game looked like a gimme, but since firing their GM back in October, Mike McDaniel has turned things around, and they haven’t lost a game. They’ll look to make it five-straight-wins, but they’ll have plenty to overcome against a Steelers team that hasn’t lost on MNF in Pittsburgh since 1991.
That’s right - the Steelers don’t lose much on Monday Night Football, especially not at home. But, you know what else they don’t do much of? - Win games without T.J. Watt. This week’s injury report is a BRUTAL one: the Steelers will be WITHOUT T.J. Watt (Lung - smh), James Pierre (Calf), and Andrus Peat (Concussion). Derrick Harmon (Knee) is questionable and has a good chance to make his return for this one. For the Dolphins, they’ll likely be without S Elijah Campbell (Knee - Doubtful), but should be good to go with the rest of their roster.
I’ve seen a lot of very confident yinzers on social media this week, and while I don’t wanna call yinz confidence misplaced, I don’t exactly share that same confidence. The stats with and without T.J. Watt in the lineup are flat-out alarming, although I think we’re better suited to manage that now than we have been at any other point in his career. I figure the tandem of Nick Herbig and Jack Sawyer will alleviate some of the pain from losing him - I’ll never view more playing time for Nick Herbig as a bad thing, although these are not the circumstances I would’ve chosen to make that happen. Beyond that, this Dolphins team is really clicking on both sides of the ball right now. They haven’t allowed more than 17 points in a game since their week 9 loss to the Ravens (the day before they fired their GM), and they’ve cleared 30 points in 2 of their last 4 games, all wins of course. Given the inconsistencies of the Steelers on both sides of the ball this season, I don’t necessarily feel like we have any major advantages on either side.
I wouldn’t say that the Dolphins offense is blazing a trail through the league or anything like that, but I have a lot of reservations about the Steelers ability to defend it. I think a huge issue that has plagued this defense throughout most of the season has been the communication miscues, and this Dolphins offense forces you to communicate A LOT. This is, to me, the most unique offense in the league: run primarily out of the pistol, their offense often features a lot of moving parts, and they do it in so many different ways. In the play above, Ollie Gordon is the “single-back”, but the ball ends up in De’Von Achane’s hands on a sweep motion with Gordon as a FB. They love to have two or three backs on the field at any one time - they even had a play in their last game against the Jets where they had three “backs” in the backfield + Tua Tagovailoa, and the ball ended up going on a reverse to Jaylen Waddle, who was lined up outside. Good luck trying to predict what this team is going to do on a play-by-play basis. Sound communication will, obviously, be everything.
The Dolphins also use extra offensive linemen like you can see in this play (above). They’re at their best when they’re running the football effectively and Tua isn’t dropping back to pass too much. All those motions, play-action fakes, all of that becomes impossible to defend when the run game is working for them. Meanwhile, the Steelers defense has allowed an average of 233 rushing yards per game over the last two games - they can’t let this Dolphins team lean on the run all night long. It’ll be cold as hell, and they will certainly try to do exactly that. If we could get Derrick Harmon back in this one, that would be massive - like TJ Watt, the stats with and without Harmon are absurd.
On the other side of the ball, the Dolphins are a pretty solid group, but they can be leaky. I watched two of their games from earlier this season ahead of tomorrow’s game, and probably the thing that struck me the most is how well these guys tackle. During their week 9 matchup against the Ravens, Derrick Henry tested their DBs outside on numerous occasions - guys like Jack Jones, Minkah Fitzpatrick, and Rasul Douglas, and they were making plays. The Dolphins 10.7% missed tackle rate is the fourth-lowest in the NFL(NGS/NFL Pro). That doesn’t bode well against a Steelers team that likes to get the ball out quick, but after last week’s vintage performance, perhaps there’s hope that Aaron Rodgers will be able to push the ball down field tomorrow night, which is where I think the Dolphins secondary can be tested.
The path to victory for the Steelers, to me, begins with stopping the run, as is often the case. The Dolphins entire playbook is, seemingly, reliant upon being on-schedule. If we can get them off-schedule on those early downs, and get Tua Tagovailoa holding on to the football, I think we can force them to make a mistake or two, and win this game pretty comfortably. With that being said, De’Von Achane is a premier RB in this league, and something tells me nothing about this game will be “comfortable”. Odds are, both teams will have some success moving the ball on offense. It’ll depend upon which defense can hold their opponent out of the end zone when the field gets shorter.
It’s December, though, so everything’s a must-win at this point. OH, and they’re honoring Ben Roethlisberger, Maurkice Pouncey, and Joey Porter at half time, so if we drop the ball in front of them, I’ll be wildly upset. Handle business.
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